The L.A. Times reports:
Californians are likely to pay more for gasoline, electricity, food and new homes — and to feel their lives jolted in myriad other ways — because their state broadly expanded its war on climate change this summer.
The ambitious new goals will require complex regulations on an unprecedented scale, but were approved in Sacramento without a study of possible economic repercussions.
There's more:
A preliminary analysis just released by the California Air Resources Board, which has sole authority to impose the new rules, projects a potential reduction of 25,000 to 102,000 jobs and the loss of $7 billion to $14 billion in gross state economic output. The board said those impacts are small relative to the state’s economy.
Other experts, however, note that too little is known to make solid predictions, while industry groups project severe consequences.
Although California set a goal of reducing greenhouse gases by 40% below 1990 levels, for example, the state did not collect greenhouse gas data before 1990. So no one can say how far back in its history as a state with cars and industry California will have to go to hit that emission level.
That benchmark could, however, require the state to emit no more carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases than it did as far back as the 1960s, based on national data that do not take into account California’s faster growth and more energy-efficient economy.
California really is bad place to make an investment. You've been warned !
